First Party System

The First Party System was a period of American politics which lasted from 1789 to 1828, during which Alexander Hamilton's Federalist Party and Thomas Jefferson's Democratic-Republican Party fought to determine the form of government and the future laws of the nascent United States. The era saw the emergence of a two-party system which would come to define American politics, and it also saw the emergence of regionalism as the Federalists found strong support in New England and the Democratic-Republicans in the American South and on the frontier. As the result of Hamilton's destructive criticism of the Federalist president John Adams, the Federalists' treasonous support for the secessionist Hartford Convention, and the concurrent Democratic-Republican-led victory in the War of 1812, the Democratic-Republicans all but annihilated the Federalists any enjoyed a monopoly on power during the Era of Good Feelings in the years following the war's end. However, the mid-1820s saw the Democratic-Republicans run four separate presidential candidates, each representing a different ideological wing of the party, and Andrew Jackson, Henry Clay, and John Quincy Adams emerged as the defining figures of a new era of politics. In 1828, former Federalists and opponents of Jackson's populism formed the National Republican Party, while most Democratic-Republicans and a few southern Federalists backed Jackson's formation of the Jacksonian Democratic Party (the Anti-Masonic Party was a significant third partY), leading to the rise of the Second Party System. The major political parties of the First Party System were:
 * Conservative dot.png The Federalist Party was a classical conservative political party founded by Alexander Hamilton to bring together members of the "Pro-Administration" faction who were united in their support for a strong central government and for a national bank. The Federalists championed the New Englander and the Southern aristocracies and big business, and they believed in limiting suffrage to wealthy, white, and male landowners, opposing what they saw as Jeffersonian "mob rule". The Federalists opposed the French Revolution and advocated for closer relations with Great Britain, leading to the Quasi-War with the French Republic. The Federalists were opposed to westward expansion, seeing the Louisiana Purchase and the ensuing settlement of the West as a threat to the balance of power between the industrialized North and the rural South, as well as increasing the risk of war with Spain, which claimed that the Louisiana Territory was rightfully theirs. Federalist opposition to the War of 1812 led to the secessionist Hartford Convention of 1814-1815, during which many Federalists called for the secession of New England. The discovery of the secession talks and the victory in the War of 1812 discredited the Federalist Party, which was eliminated as a major national political force.
 * Liberal dot.png The Democratic-Republican Party was a classical liberal political party founded by Thomas Jefferson to bring together "Anti-Administration" politicians who opposed Hamilton's centralizing reforms (especially his financial plan and his support for a national bank) and supported populist agrarianism. The Democratic-Republicans saw themselves as the champions of the country's poorest citizens and its yeoman farmers, and they advocated for expanded suffrage, states' rights, limited government, constitutional originalism, and support for the French Revolution. The party was strongest in the American South and weakest in New England, and they first came to power in 1801, continuously holding the presidency until their demise in 1828. The party came to have a radical and expansionist wing which supported the Louisiana Purchase and the War of 1812, as well as a conservative anti-expansionist "Old Republican" wing (the Tertium quids), who questioned the constitutionality of westward expansion and opposed the liberals' later support for a national bank. Partisan divisions were erased during the Era of Good Feelings, only to fatally reappear during the 1820s and destroy the party.